We’ve heard this before from McCrory during a press conference earlier this month, after state auditor Beth Wood presented a scathing audit of administrative overruns in the program. For the NCHN story, see here:

recent audit showed the past admin overspent on M… GA is able to deliver M services at 4K per pt, while NC is 6K per pt. #ncga #ncpol #SOTSNC Health News

The governor talked about Medicaid costs. North Carolina is known for having a “generous” Medicaid benefit. NC ranks 21st in the country in cost per enrollee, $6,098 per person. Georgia, on the other hand, ranks 50th spending $3,979 per beneficiary.

Much of the South is a little closer to NC than to GA: Virginia, $5,870; Kentucky, $5,890; South Carolina, $5,181; Tennessee, $4,742; Alabama, $4,081(all numbers from Kaiser Family Foundation, 2009)

There’s no doubt the Medicaid program has had inefficient administration, with poor tracking of expenditures. But some on the Democratic side of the aisle point out that former HHS Secretary Lanier Cansler told legislators some of the savings they were looking for from Medicaid would be unattainable.
According to auditor Beth Wood, administrators at Medicaid then said, “OK lawmakers, we’ll save you that money,” but had no intention of doing it.

McCrory introduces first lady, and 2 who have turned their lives around at the Durham Rescue Mission. #SOTSBarry Smith

This is probably the one part of the speech that people on both sides of the aisle could agree on: NC needs a better mental health system and more opportunities to help people with addictions.

McCrory started talking about addiction by introducing several people who stopped abusing substances with help from the folks at the Durham Rescue Mission. He talked about visiting the facility with his wife Anne.

@PatMcCroryNC #SOTS @RescueDurham quoting Anne “We could say why don’t they just quit doing drugs. These people have more courage than us.”Tom Murry

It’s an interesting question Schofield asked. The governor stated early in his speech that revenues were essentially the same as last year. If he wants these things funded, they’ll be competing with a lot of other issues.

This comment got a lot of re-tweets. It’s a question to consider: does the governor consider tobacco a dangerous substance? In NC Health News Monday morning, State Health Director Laura Gerald pointed out tobacco is the leading preventable cause of death in North Carolina. Read it here: http://bit.ly/WT1jR1

Finally, the only real mention of health care issues from the Democratic opposition came from Sen. Josh Stein (D-Wake).

In the NC Health News story published Friday, http://bit.ly/XdQbL1 the CFO of Southeastern Regional Hospital said just this. During the floor debate, legislators mentioned petitions from hospital leaders in Cleveland and Scotland counties to expand the Medicaid program.

And a spokesman from the NC Hospital Association pointed out that rejecting the Medicaid expansion means NC hospitals would lose up to $5 billion in reimbursements over the next decade.